Class Pride and Sexists Misconceptions
by ConstanceBoniful
Summary: P&P, in the beginning of the thirties in France... In a boarding school for the children of the elite of nobility and bourgeoisie, Elizabeth meets the distainful and haughty William de Darcy and soon a war brew on the horizon... I'll try to post a chapter every week.
1. S' Boarding School

The carriage slowed down before it finally stopped. My father glanced quickly through the window then leant toward me, taking in one of those deep breaths he never missed to take whenever he addressed me: "It looks like the time to part is finally upon us. I will not let you go without urging you to uphold the honour of our family. The Bennets always fought to maintain their dignity and earn the respect of _others_. I struggled on my life to reach the social station I'm passing on to you today. As for you, you are a young maid in a man's world. You will need strength, firmness and boldness to manage to establish yourself and make your opinions valued. Above all, it's necessary that you always remember your true worth, whatever might happen to shake your beliefs. I won't keep you any longer. I will only advise you to remember what I've told you today. Farewell, little one. Many adventures will befall you before we see each other again. I would prefer if you would not write to me. It's necessary that you learn to depend only on yourself". To this day, I still remember precisely the words my father pronounced that day, as stayed deeply imprinted in my mind. It's not so much some incredible memory of mine that made it possible for me to remember his words than the fact that my father had at the time such a big impact on me that as soon as I left him, I diligently laid down on paper his words, which would be his last ones to me before a long time... After that day, whenever I found myself in a jam, I went back to read his words again, attempting to discover some illuminating meaning that would help me to overcome the hurdles I met on my journey.

With the help of the driver, I exited the carriage and was immediately struck by the heat still raging at the end of August. Thomas Hills, my father's driver who raised me with his wife Jane escorted me while carrying my luggage on the pebbly footpath winding to the boarding school. We had only a glimpse of the building, all foggy because of the heat, hidden by the shadow of a few large weeping willows. My father did not exit the carriage, he did not bore heat well and despite our mutual affection, I strongly suspected that he was glad to finally be rid of me. As for Thomas, he gave me warm farewell, hugging me tight in his arms and advising me to write as soon as I felt I needed to. I was alone to discover my new life. I was 15 and I had enrolled into S***'s boarding school, which became a home to me. I was to spend three years of my life and graduate from high school there.

It's now time to enlighten you as to my familial background. My father stemmed from a family of rich peasants without manners or education who mostly owned land. He resented his modest background but loved his family who bled dry to support him through his studies. He worked hard and was rather successful, managing to become the chief officer of a respectable-sized company. He didn't keep well in touch with his family in the country, although he sent me there every summer so that I wasn't in his way. When he turned thirty, he got into his head to marry my mother. She was from gentility and her ruined family had, out of desperation, given their consent to the degrading alliance.

My mother, who never parted from her contempt towards my father, never forgave him for pulling her out of misery and she died a few months after my birth. I'm told that I look a lot like her, but I have only ever heard of her from Mr. and Mrs. Hills and even they did not knew her long, so I don't know much about her. My father, bitter, never remarried and entrusted my education to an all-girls private catholic school that I hated through and through and where I never made any friends. Luckily for me, Jane and Thomas never had any kids and they doted on me all my life, giving me the affection my father denied me. In return, I attempted to be the best I could be to make them proud and I loved them as though they were my real parents.

I was 15 years old when I entered the real world, without the net of my home and my loved ones, to become the student of a very unusual boarding school. And when I say unusual, that's not the half of it. It was a boarding school for the kids of rich families who had modern ideas. The atypical boarding school mostly distinguished itself by its mixing of sexes, its eccentric direction and its odd school program. The students all shared the room they were assigned to with another resident; there was a boy's wing and a girl's wing embracing the main building. A lot of students got married straight out after graduating, to the greatest joy of their parents. Social reproduction was one of the goals of the boarding school's direction and it justified the unusual mixing of sexes. This scheme seemed more appropriate then the assemblies gathering only the best families where the young barely had time to get acquainted. It was a relief for the parents, who no longer had to steer their children to a suitable match. However, there was still a larger number of boys than girls in the school, the proximity of the opposing sex being judged more dangerous for us.

On that first night, we ate separately from the boys. My disappointment was however wavered by the opportunity to meet some of my fellow students: Mary, Jane, Kitty and Lydia. We first conversed about very serious matters. We attempted to convince Kitty and Lydia that it was not tolerable to be financially dependent on a man, even if that man happened to be our husband. When we saw that we didn't get to them – they put domestic happiness and the joy of finding the perfect husband before anything else – I tried to put the discussion toward a better topic:

"So be it. We cannot find common ground on that matter. But let me please entertain the hope that we can find something else to talk about! Come on, let's see, isn't there something light for us to chat about?

"Elizabeth is right, picked up Charlotte, as far as I'm concerned, these topics are a bore. We are not longer standing in our parents' houses! We can speak freely. Tell me, do you read poetry?"

And once again we began to discuss with passion. This time around, we talked about Ronsard, Lamartine, Nerval, Hugo, Musset, Vigny and even Shakespeare, that we love even though we had only ever read him in translations. Romantic poetry was the most alluring thing to the young girls that we were then. We swoon over those sensitive and passionate men gifted with the talent to intertwine words in a manner we believed to be so spontaneous and so just. We pitied their sorrow and dreamt to be the ones to tear their hearts apart... This supper was quickly to go by and very weary from all the novelty the day had brought, we were yawning on our way to bed.

The day that followed was dedicated to the presentation of our future school days and we hardly ever worked. Our teachers introduced the programme for the year to come and we acknowledged our schedules. That was however not the highlight of that day, I would have never remembered were it not for the event that followed. Each member of our class – we were 25 and only 9 girls – was invited to present itself. Regarding the girls, I only discovered three having already met all the others, namely Charlotte, Jane and Mary with who we shared our bathroom and Kitty and Lydia we had met at diner. The three last girls, Caroline, Louisa and Éléonore were quickly labelled as cheap little gossips, despite their flawless faces.

As for the boys... If most of them were admirably unremarkable, the arrogance and evil disposition of some of them managed to infuriate me despite my initial pleasant mood. A boy by the name of William particularly aroused my wrath. He was fairly tall, well-build unlike those striplings who had grown up too fast and had kept their childish faces and bodies despite being full grown. He had dark hair and very blue and piercing eyes. When I first looked upon him I reckoned him as extremely peasant, as his general demeanour was not without a certain class and his gaze without openness and genuineness. I was however quick to witness my error. This young man – and I urge you to believe that I'm not inventing anything and that those are the very words he pronounced – introduced himself in this manner.

After having waited until the whispers that accompanied all the other presentations stopped, he finally started to speak with a crooked smile:

"As for me I bear the name of William de Darcy and my nobility goes back – Thank goodness – way before the Empire[1] and I therefore bid you to address me with the regards due to my rank. Furthermore, I am not in a custom to waste my time. So if you are indeed a girl or if your conversion is devoid of interest I urge you not approach me, any acquaintance with you does not interest me".

A few snigger rose in the room and a boy named Charles seated next to him even begun to applause feebly. We learned a while later that the nobility of this Charles was about as old as Crusades. The young nobility of the crowd had appreciated the speech of this energumen and it seemed as if for a large part, they were moulded on the same model as this William. We were very happy to discover later that it was not the case. Even if most of the class stemmed from nobility, they were not for all that scornful to those of us who weren't. But we did not figured this out until a later date and were at the time unaware that our classmates were not as bad as they seemed.

The moment to introduce myself came right after his. And in order to counter his head-on attack, I adjusted my speech and retorted thusly:"I bear the name Elizabeth Bennet, I don't pretend to carry royal blood on my veins, but on the other hand, my tolerance goes as far as considering the conversation of the member of the other sex – however inferior I deem them – as something that may not be void of interest. But in some cases, I just have to confess that it is." Hubert and a few other boys taunted my speech, but I saw some smile creeping on the faces of my new friends. When everybody was done speaking, the day was already well spent and it was time for us to go back to our rooms.

With Charlotte, Jane and Mary, we started commenting the events of the day. Charlotte was full of praises for one of our teachers, highlighting the alleged beauty of his eyes. Jane kept saying that a boy never stopped staring at her all day, but deflected his gaze each time she laid eyes on him. Mary mischievously asked if she also deemed his eyes gorgeous, to which Jane answered:"Who do you think I am? Do you really believe that I am going to succumb to the charm of a boy of 15 years old on the simple motive that he deigned to notice me? No, you really have the wrong idea!" Laughing at her offended answer, we did not dare to point out that she was of the same age as this "boy".

With Mary, we laughed a little about the somewhat down to earth reactions of our friends. To be truthful, we both had darker inklings:"This doesn't bode well for the future, sighted Mary. We are girls and commoners and one would want us believe these things to be unforgiveable wrongs..." Neither of us was of noble blood, unlike Charlotte and Jane. But our dark considerations were overruled by the overall good mood. We cheerfully got back to our rooms. Dinner went by uneventfully, for we didn't yet dare to mingle with the boys. I share a table with Charlotte, Jane and Mary and the four of us were already inseparable. Charlotte related some anecdotes about her family, and especially one of her aunt how we scarcely believed she was as grotesque as Charlotte made her out to be.

Charlotte told that her aunt Catherine de Bourges saw assassination attempts everywhere and had therefore all of her meals tasted by three different people before she even considered taking a bite. Her cook, her butler and her husband all had to indulge to her whims, fearing to be dismissed for the formers and to be prey to her incessant jabbering for the latter. The wailing of Aunt Catherine was wide-known and widely dreaded, hence everybody submitted to her fancies, never daring to question her decision or chuckled at her scares. Charlotte explained to us how her father never visited Catherine with the rest of her family, for each time she saw her brother in law, she was in the habit of spraying him with holy waters, claiming him to be possessed. To achieve her purposes, she carried a vial of water her confessor regularly blessed at all time (Charlotte's father was apparently not the only "possessed" person in Catherine's entourage).

Her behaviour towards her peers was so unpredictable that the aunt barely went out, forcing everybody – including her confessor and her family – to come to her. And she made everybody forced to stand her go raving mad. She had for example a frantic taste for the colour red and never dressed in other colour, which is one thing, but she also couldn't stand to see anything yellow. If she saw, let it be only a daffodil, she fainted in dramatic howls of terror. And her antics didn't apparently end there. Charlotte was far for finished with her stories when we were told to go to bed, but she could have talked to us all night and we wouldn't have been bored. She knew had a very nice turn of phrases and knew had a classy way to turn her story. Her tone was light but cleverly critical, something I really appreciated about her already. And even all those years later, I still remember that night as a little moment of happiness whose memory still fills me with joy.

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[1] Napoleon Bonaparte's Empire in the beginning of the 19th century, de Darcy means to slight the people who became noble at a very late date and were never considered as real nobility by the rest.


	2. The thorn on my side

**I know I probably made a lot of mistake, so I would be glad if somebody were to point them out to me.**

The next day, I had almost forgotten that William even existed, remembering only the joy I had to be in high school, to already have good friends, rejoicing at the favourable weather – it would be remiss from its part to not make a appearance for the end of the week that would eventually arrive. I joked with Charlotte who had trouble waking up, evoking a dreadfully sore back. In order to get her to finally get up, I had to throw a glass of water on her face. She then decided to retaliate, chasing me around our room with a other glass – an unfair fight since I had already used all my ammunitions! We both ended up too wet for our liking. It was the first real day of school. We went to class and very quickly, I regretted the optimism I demonstrated when I first woke up. My feelings of joy and well-being vanished more rapidly that I had ever thought possible. William put all of his efforts in that direction, as far as I could tell.

When the time came to gain our seats, William and his henchman Charles came towards us to greet us in a courteous manner, though tainted with irony and spite. They however only condescended to greet the seven noble girls. I was – as one can easily surmise – livid with anger. I tried not to let it show, but Mary made me understand that my efforts were all for nothing. She whispered my way:

"Why in heaven are you so furious? Had they greeted me, I would have refused to acknowledge them. You should in any case let their ungentlemanly behaviour get to you. And just think of it: if they appreciated us, we would have to stand their company much longer!" she teased me.

On that day, Jane, Charlotte, Mary and I assumed the ownership of the four places directly before the teacher's desk. Charles and William, as well as some kind of buffoon going by the name of Dennis Hurt and another of their friend chose to seat right behind us. Thes places were to be ours for the rest of the whole year. I attempted to shine by my comments during class and I believe I was successful. Glancing stealthily at William, I thought William was baffled when hearing some of my witty remarks. I could of course be wrong, but such was my impression. I even believed for a split second that he might reconsider his ready judgement about Mary and me. This wishful thinking did not however last long and scarcely a few minutes later; he made haste to demonstrate the wrongfulness of my assessment.

I made the first of those retorts that only he managed to do and that had the power to make me loose all of my self-confidence. His retort made me question the veracity of my words. It was only the first one of many to come, but it stroked me to my core. Subsequently, the steadiness of the remarks he constantly handed out to me manage to erode their effectiveness and I usually could brush them easily out of my mind. From time to time and when I expected it the least, he however managed to shoot an unexpected pike at me which hurt me almost as much as the first time.

I then remembered bitterly my joy when my father announced me his decision to send me to boarding school. I had believed this to be the beginning of a new independent life, in which I would be alone, capable of acting by myself and taking decisions by myself. This aspiration was constantly on my thoughts ever since I crossed the portal of the school. William denied me my freedom, plainly and simply, by judging me not as I conducted myself, but as society labelled me: a girl from the bourgeoisie, raised in luxury and insouciance.

Despite the little regard I had to this uncouth boy's judgment, I could be completely satisfied as long as he kept considering me thusly. As soon as I started laughing or enjoying anything, meeting his disapproving gaze was enough to crush me. His constant judgment of my every move was the everlasting thorn on my side. Until I was completely rid of it, I would not feel completely free and in control of my life.

In literary class as well as in philosophy or sociology class, students' interventions were highly encouraged and the "four of the front row", as the other students began quickly to call us, were always up to the task, taking risks to answer questions, while the rest of the class preferred not to engage in the activity, for answering sometimes rather randomly to the questions of our teachers could attract the attention of the rest of the class and one could be publically humiliated if the answers were not correct. As for me, I have always spoke my mind and I was never able to resist speaking whenever I felt appropriate to do so, which quite frankly, was often at inappropriate times. It was a real hassle to unpick the quirk when I got older.

I should nonetheless have learned to stay silent very quickly. Indeed, William – and sometimes even Charles who didn't restraint himself from ordering me to be quiet with a sardonic arrogance that had more to do with panache that with real vehemence – seemed to have developed a particular loathing for my comments. Every time I dared interrupt a class with a comment or a question, I started sighting or mimicking my voice when I said something stupid or something he thought was stupid. The main problem being that he obviously deemed just about anything I had to say stupid. Blaming me for slowing down the classes, he ultimately spoke up just as often as I did, one other point of grievances in the long list of things I reproached him.

His interventions were varied. Most of the time he contented himself with mocking me, in a voice laud enough for me to hear but not enough to reach the ears of the professor. Only he didn't stop at just mocking me! I would have bore his childish misdemeanour had I been his only target. But his speeches were often more general. He was a fervent admirer of Carl Schmitt's theories and Mussolini's regime and he even had elected to learn Italian as a second language because of him. But the most ignominious aspects of his personality were his aristocratic pride and the contempt toward the plebs that came with it, along his inexplicable scorn towards women.

In this respect, he never missed a chance to remind us of his opinion on that particular matter. In his twisted mind, one had to bear noble blood or be docile, a man or be ruled over. Women only sparked off spite from him; they were a recreation one shares with other men and easily get bored of. Besides procreation, the pleasure stemming from intercourses with women was made to be their only usefulness in this moron twisted vision of the world.

He always bestowed a warm welcome on Mary and me: "There, look at these, old friend", he said speaking to Charles, watching us half-mocking half-disdainful, "here come the Jew and her friend the parvenu". Even Charles who seemed to go along with William's schemes in the beginning appeared to be asking for forgiveness, watching Jane with puppy dog eyes. Jane had finally, after hours of pleading, admitted that her mysterious admirer was none other than William's best friend Charles. One would have thought the new information could only arouse dissentions in our group, but the idea of this star-crossed love was too appealing for any of us to find something reprehensible about it.

Nonetheless, even if Charles didn't seem to be as harmful as William, he still firmly refused to speak to Mary and me. One would think he saw the devil when he looked at us, seeing how he seemed unable to decide how to behave in our presence. He was lost, between being brought up in a very strict family – he had been raised by Jesuits[1] before his mother sent him in our school – and his steady friendship with William. One should not however exempt him of all responsibility. He was William's best friend and even if Jane's claimed he was not as extremist as him, he never publically or privately disowned him.

It had been over a month since we started classes when I resolved that I would not suffer William's gibes any longer and start acting to counteract him instead. My initial plan, putting him up to ridicule by having much better grades than him revealed its flaws very quickly: William was brilliant and he often had better results than me. Furthermore, his culture was not confined to Italy. He seemed to have a thorough knowledge in many areas, a fact that never stopped annoying me immensely. We each had our subjects of predilection, but neither of us was able to outrun the other in all the classes. Sciences and sports were naturally ruled out of this competition, not noble enough topics to be worthy of recognition. Despite my relentless efforts, we were systematically _ex aequo_. Jane, Mary, Charlotte, Charles, William and I were the top of the class. This pace of competition wore me out more than I can tell. Charlotte and I worked constantly, sometimes even after dinner, before stumbling exhausted into bed.

One night, with Charlotte, we ran away from the school. Well, not really, but we gave ourselves a whiff of adventure... We were about to go to sleep, when a few notes of music slipped into my ear. Twas a passage from the Purcell's opera _Dido and Æneas_, that my father had taken me to see a few months back. I had loved it so much that he bought me the score. "Ah ! Belinda... I am blessed with torments..." I could not untie myself from the intoxication these few notes I would always remember had awoken in me. And I just didn't want to go to bed just yet.

I was in a wild mood, with the blazing urge to take a walk in the school's ground in the night, with the full moon as my only light... "I am blessed with torments not to be confessed". Charlotte herself was dreamy. The day had been monotonous and we weren't feverish as we usually were at that time of the day. We used to laugh and talk very long before we went to sleep, but that night none of us uttered a word. Charlotte started unravelling her plaits, but she stopped and rested her hands on her laps: "What would you think if we went to see how the moon fares, outside", she murmured. I got up, took my coat and put my shoes back on. Charlotte was still seated, her eyes gazing into the void. Then, without thinking, she got up and also got ready.

At the beginning of the year, the surveillance was very strict in the hallway. But by the end of autumn, the winter starting to appear, everything was quiet and our jailer as we liked to call them, had given up their close surveillance, believing to have induced us to sleep early and not leave our rooms at night. They only came around to check that the 11 o clock curfew was applied and the clock had just rung. Our room was on the first floor, close to services stairs directly leading to the outside. As we had hoped, the door was not locked. We exited the building on tiptoes and stridden off quickly to the woods. Once we arrived beyond the first few shrubberies, we loosened up our caution, started running with all our strength and crumbled on a pile of fallen leaves.

We spoke a very long time, about how we saw our future, our husbands perhaps, our children definitely... The night was quiet. Only a fresh breeze had risen and fluttered through the powerful trees. I started to hum Purcell's song. Charlotte asked me what it was. Memories, I answered, memories... We stayed what felt like an eternity on this pile of leaves, marvelled at our sense of freedom while enjoying a few stolen cigarettes. We had the night all to ourselves.

We then sneaked back to our room with the same cautious we used to sneak out. We fell asleep effortless. The morrow rose while we were still soaked on our nocturnal jaunt. We never mentioned the things we talked about during that night ever again. We had felt to close and it was a memory that we wanted to cherish. When we got to history class, William initiated a few taunting comments as usual. But he never managed to get anything other than a dreamy smile out of me.

I shared a few conniving glances with Charlotte, the only one who knew why I was acting so out of character. We also yawned in concert, raising the suspicion of our friends who had to be enlightened as to the reason of our apparent fatigue after class. But in the meantime, Mary stared at me in shock, wondering what had happened to induce such a change in my behaviour. She systematically answered to William for me and to his great dismay; William started to address his snarky comments directly at her. Poor William... He probably did not even realize the emptiness of his speeches... One day maybe, he would realize the error of his way and on that day, I was perfectly ready to forgive him for his behaviour. This generous mood did not last for long...

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[1] Look it up ! La Compagnie de Jésus, fervent catholic focusing on education and on spreading their faith. Their schools are very strict.


	3. Of the delightful agony of idleness

**Sorry for the delay.**

Three months... How time flew by... Surprisingly, we were already accustomed to the bizarre routine of the boarding school. We got up at seven every day. We had to have showered and be ready to go to class at seven thirty. We then had a light breakfast and just a few minutes to get to class. We had class from 8 to 14, with only three breaks: two very short ones lasting only about five minutes and one that lasted about twenty. Then we had lunch and towards three thirty, we had languages classes.

After that, we were free to do whatever we wanted – within reason – until an early supper at eight that lasted about an hour and a half. In any case, we had to turn out every light at eleven. We were reluctant at first to adapt to this schedule that allowed so very little time for sleep, but we quickly figured out its purpose. It left us a lot of freedom and we weren't hindered by a lengthy lunch break that set our tongues wagging, something that was put to a profit by our German, English and Russian teachers as far as I was concerned.

No, really, I liked it very much. And even more so because of the fact that if this school trained us to take the baccalauréat[1], they however used a pretty eccentric program to do so. We had to choose if we wanted to study literature or sciences during the summer previous to entering the school. Thusly, we didn't waste any time studying subjects what would become irrelevant to our future studies or carriers. My class was the literary one and there was only one other class for the scientists, both with about 25 students. The school only required us to take a few scientific subjects which were all taught on Monday, hence the general dislike of that day in our class.

The rest of our time was shared between literature, history, geography, philosophy and even a bit of sociology in the mornings and foreign languages in the afternoon. The school offered the possibility to learn dead languages and take arts class that were not mandatory on Saturday. We had sports on Saturday morning, a subject a profoundly despised, but in the afternoon, Jane went to drawing and painting classes, while I went to the choir and musical theory's class, class I both shared with William and Charles to my utter annoyance. Mary, true to herself took both Latin and ancient Greek, while Charlotte learned about acting and theatre history.

I would have loved to also learn about theatre with Charlotte, but at the end of the day, we were both doing what we liked the most and wouldn't have switched places for the world. I loved our choir, the feeling of belonging to a group, every one of us aiming to sing as perfectly as we could. Musical theory wasn't a first for me, but since the level was rather high, we studied very interesting things and there was even a portion of time dedicated to composition. And on Saturday night, we held a wake and studied astronomy and mythology in the winter garden. It was a time of quiet and we weren't required to take notes.

On Sunday, it was theoretically forbidden to do any work. We rested, slept longer in the morning and wrote to our families. But mostly, the four of us stayed in our rooms to chat quietly about anything or we went to the library to read from the enormous amount of books stored there. Every once in a while, Jane abandoned us to spend time with Charles, in which case we inevitably ran into William, alone and disoriented, wandering aimlessly about.

The school had a very large and thorough library, with books from many century and in many languages. It was overall very dusty, but we still love to seek refuge and lose ourselves in the cosy corners of that enchanting old place. One of our favourite games in the library was to search the shelves for books from Marx, Bakunin, Sade[2] or any subversive book really. We never achieved to find anything remotely scandalous, but Charlotte was convinced that such important works could not be ignored in this prolific place. The library was often empty, especially on Sunday, but the librarian was always there, part of the background.

He was a small podgy kind of man, despite being always busy, trying to no end to sort the books. But not only did the more than significant amount of book (let's call it what it was, there was a book for each bite Gargantuan ever ate in his entire life, I'm positive) kept him from reaching a systematic filing of the books, he also frequently changed his mind about the way to get around to do so. During our first year, we witnessed him attempt to file the books by genre than by language, before he changed his mind three months later to file them by authors, no matter the language or genre...

Jane was convinced the only reason he hadn't been lay off, useless as he was, was that while he moved the books out of their shelves to re-file them, part of the dust they were covered in fell on the floor, so in a way, he did clean the library a little bit. Truth be told, while it was obvious that his attempts on the filing fields were vastly fruitless, the books were not any cleaner, not that it bothered us.

This library was a real maze. Shelves were everywhere, even in the most incongruous places. It was a gigantic room and it was not square as one would expect, but crooked, with recesses in every corner, furnished with ancient tables and motley ageless straw chairs. We particularly enjoyed taking refuge there on Sunday afternoons, staying close to one of the many fireplaces needed to warm this room, located at the top of the biggest of the three towers of the school.

We brought books with us, but we didn't claim to plan on reading a single line. As soon as we started reading, one of us would start telling us an anecdote about her book and we inevitably drifted off to another topic, our books long forgotten. Furthermore, in addition to the books, the library held shelves, tables and other pieces of furniture where we were always certain to find something interesting. At times it was letters, there were a lot of letters, of bashful lovers, of soldiers to their beloved, sometimes it was bills, but also maps, manuscripts young authors had sent to our director, hoping for him to give them advice. In a word, this surprising library never ceased to amaze us.

We also took up walking into the generously-portioned park of the school. No path was left unexplored and we searched every shrubbery in hopes to find a place to call our own. In the park, we gave free rein to our imagination and allowed ourselves to dream of the future. We teased Jane in order to collect details about her curious friendship with Charles, we imagined the man of our dreams, the one for who we would be ready to disown celibacy and the sweetness of single life and peacefulness.

We held very different views on that matter. Mary, ever the rational one, inspired to meet – if she could as she kept repeating – and share her life with a man who shared her beliefs and her hard-felt sense of morale. As long as she found a steady and well-read man, she assured us that his appearance and charm wouldn't matter. Despite the great shyness we had discover in our friend Jane when it came to her feelings, her eyes were languid when she talked about the man of her dreams who – despite her protests – was disturbingly similar to Charles...

It was however the position of Charlotte I found the hardest to understand. She seemed to lack any ounce of romanticism. When she was not paying inexplicable attentions to the best preserved teachers we had, she talked about marrying for interest. It seemed as if she didn't believe in love, a terrifying thought for me: how could she be so cynical at only 15?

As for myself, I had resolved to remain single unless I met my soul-mate, true love or whatever you choose to call it. Nothing less would suffice. A man of a certain height (my friends agreed there, being with a man shorter than us was simply unthinkable), possessing a certain class, intelligent, quick and witty, able to debate with passion, but also caring, courteous and loving...

We were forced to concede that the quest for the perfect man was not one of the easiest et surely, we would not meet our soul mate while we stayed within the grounds of our school. Jane was very adamant about that point, something that did not escape our notice. It was hilarious to witness her blush to her ears when Mary pointed it out.

We were sometimes joined by Cathy and Lydia in our idleness. Those two had quickly grown to be inseparable. An exterior observer might have found difficult to see the balance in this atypical relationship. Cathy was rather shy and reserved when Lydia wasn't around. She was shaped as a big asparagus, somewhat uncomfortable with her body, but when she opened up, you could meet a girl full of hopes and carrying high romantic ideals. She had a good soul, despite her choice to give her entire trust to Lydia.

The latter was very petite and slightly stocky – a polite way to say that she was stouter that one would expect in a young dynamic girl as herself -, but it suited her perfectly. She was always energetic and enthusiastic, but she lacked reflection, in spite of her willingness. She always talked without thinking, as did I you might say. But unlike me, Lydia spoke laud when everybody stayed quiet, fell asleep in our most tiresome classes et never managed to fall asleep because of her agitation at night (according to Cathy). But most importantly, she spent all of her time concocting rather ineffective schemes to achieve her ultimate goal: penetrating the boys' dorms during the night.

It was not an easy task to figure out the identity of the boy she had bestowed her favours upon and for whom she was willing to take that much risks and go to that much lengths. One day, it was William who induced her sighs, but she was rapidly dissuaded when I glace angrily at her. Indeed, William was very good-looking, smart and rather popular. Nevertheless, he was my nemesis and no friend worth having would dare to be infatuated with her friend's nemesis.

Another day, it was at Charles that she making eyes and it would be very lenient to Lydia to say that it didn't go unnoticed. Everybody acknowledged her attempts to gain his attention, including the chief interested party. As soon as he noticed Lydia's behaviour, Charles started fidgeting uncomfortably in his chair, glancing frequently in Jane's direction, a fact that didn't stop Lydia from staring at him with her head in her hands until it was time to head to lunch.

Luckily, Mary took the situation to her own hands, reminding Lydia that becoming infatuated with her friend's sweetheart – "But he is not my sweetheart", quickly objected Jane who seemed nonetheless relieved – was even worse that showing interest for her friend's nemesis. Lydia was a good-natured girl at heart, so she quickly nodded and swore that she would steer clear of our boyfriends – "Nemesis, Lydia, nemesis", I added – before she turned her attention to yet another boy. True be told, I am fairly convinced that Dennis Hurt aside, every boy in our class had at one time or another been the unfortunate recipient of the ephemeral, yet deep, affection of our dear Lydia.

But I do not believe that the mention of Lydia's schemes can have escaped your notice. Those preposterous scenarios, always implying Cathy's involvement, generally resulted in severe remonstrance and relatively severe punishments. Severe scolding because of their length (nothing was more tedious to Lydia than having to sit still in her chair for a several consecutive minutes), relatively severe punishments depending on the view of its recipient. I for one do not believe that being forced to join the choir and rhetoric's classes to "mobilize the overflowing energy of the young lady" counted as a real punishment, but to Lydia, this was hell.

The poor Cathy was fortunately often distinguished from her classmate when their failed plans were exposed. But worse than a punishment, the sadness and disapproval she read on the principal's eyes filled her with an utmost contrition that generally lasted until the next brilliant idea of Lydia. Do not fear, I will share with you some of those genius ideas.

Once, Lydia came up with a plan to break into the boys' dorms through the sours. Upon further examination, it turned out that XVIIth century manors are not equipped with sours, a detail that should really be deemed trivial since the dorms where on the second and third stories anyhow. Discarding the sours (but not before the two of them searched for them for two weeks in a row), she turned to the roof. At this point, I have to explain that the girls' dorms were at the opposite of the boys', the two wings being separated by the central building, hosting the entire direction and teaching staff of the school.

And let's not forget about Lydia's legendary stealth. She could have awoken the dead when she walked above the principal's room. Placing a suspicious amount of confidence in her climbing abilities, she tried to climb the walls from the outside and then go through the windows. I have to admit that it wasn't her stupidest plan. She could however have predicted that the windowpane she threw her harpoon into would make a little bit of noise when it broke into a million pieces. She even resorted to cross-dressing. The thing is, I was not exaggerating earlier when I said she was small. Lydia was not taller than 1.55 meters and was caught under two minutes, while it took about two more hours for Cathy to be discovered.

Lydia was very thorough and dedicated when it came to implement every doomed-to-fail plans she could think of. After exhausting her long list of possibilities, she was however forced to abandon her design indefinitely. At that point, she found a new endeavour and started making a sheet rope in order to flee the school through her third floor window, trying to imitate Rapunzel. She quickly arrived to the conclusion that using her sheets as rope left her somewhat exposed to the arrival of winter. Her conclusions were rapidly confirmed by a bad cold and she was bedridden for a week.

That being said, how many discussions did we have with Lydia and Cathy over the best way to run away from the school... Of course, we were all talk, none of us really planning to flee, but those schemes filled many hours and nothing sharpened our minds more than finding flaws in our plans, demonstrating that we did not put them in motion because of their inevitable failure and not because of our cowardice.

* * *

[1] French graduation, it's a big exam at the end of high school, going back to the XIIIth century.

[2] Marx and Bakunin fathered communism and anarchism respectively and Sade is a XVIIIth century French writer famous for his erotic and overall subversive books that is surprisingly still taught in school...


End file.
